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Sunday, November 14, 2010

I am often asked about the meaning of the title: The Middle of the Air.

First of all, it’s a phrase from a song I heard years ago.I think I originally heard the Bob Dylan version of the song on his first album. The whole line was: Meet me Jesus, meet me. Meet me in the middle of the air. It was jus one of those lines that stayed with me. I guess I would from time to time play around with what exactly that might mean.

For the purposes of this book it refers to a couple of things. For one, it is the title of a painting by one of the main characters, James Colebrook, aka Pipo. This is one of many unusual paintings encountered in the journey of the book.

On another level the middle of the air refers to the origin of new thoughts or visions or insights. It is my experience, and the experience of many other people that it feels like these things come from somewhere outside of ourselves.Some would call this the voice of a muse or the voice of God, and others would say the feeling comes from the right brain talking to the left brain. I have not idea how to explain it, I can only say if feels like it comes from somewhere out there; from the middle of the air.

Finally, the action of the book takes place mostly in the mountains of North Carolina, and there is a little bit of satellite technology involved, both kind of up there in the middle of the air.